Thursday, December 17, 2015

It’s a boulevard
of all the ills Santens believes basic income will solve: the shuffling
homeless people — they could get cash in one fell swoop instead of
extracting it from a byzantine welfare system. Lining the sidewalk are
drug dealers; they could do something else, and their customers — not
having to self-medicate their desperation — might dry up, too. We pass
the Crazy Horse strip club. No one would have to dance or do sex work
out of poverty, leaving it to the true aficionados. The high-interest
payday loan shop would lose its raison d’etre.

The
thought experiment of basic income serves as a Rorschach test of one’s
beliefs about human nature: some people instantly worry that human
enterprise would be reduced to playing PlayStation; others point to the
studies of cash transfers that show people increase their working hours
and production. One cash transfer program
in North Carolina revealed long-term beneficial effects on Cherokee
children whose parents received some $6,000 a year from a distribution
of casino profits. (The kids were more likely to graduate high school on
time, less likely to have psychiatric or alcohol abuse problems in
adulthood.) No one debates that $1,000 a month, the amount usually
discussed as a basic income in the U.S., would only be enough to cover
the basics — and in expensive cities like San Francisco, not even that.
Anyone wanting to live with greater creature comforts would still have
the carrot of paid work.

Hayek said in The Road to Serfdom that there is no reason a prosperous civilized nation cannot guarantee a minimum standard of living for everyone but to me this stretches beyond that. There is a difference between guaranteeing that your citizens don't starve or freeze to death and just handing out money. Moral Hazard is real and I believe that the fasts way to stop innovation and productivity is to give people just enough to get by, because that is what they will do - get by.

Descriptions of the books are at the original link. Honestly there are only 3 in the list that interest me and one of them is a DC product sos I know without looking it will be retarded. Of the rest maybe at some point I will read them but really, I feel like a slacker if I don't at least make an effort. Actually I read a pretty substantial excerpt of Coates book and I wan't that impressed. (I thought I blogged about it but now I can't find it)

Like most government programs, I am sure this one will be well thought out, cost effective and will solve the problem it is aimed at without inflicting a multitude of others. In my hear of hearts I know this to be true.

About Me

53 year old white male oozing privilege and advantage, if you find that sort of thing sexy. But, I care about the less fortunate if you don't. Either way I'm an idiot so take it all with a grain of salt.